'Passion of Spies (1967)' is something along the lines of an animated Soviet "Get Smart." This 21-minute cartoon by Yefim Gamburg satirises, with barely any dialogue, the clichés of contemporary spy movies. The animation style itself is distinctly Russian, particularly the highly- angular caricatured facial features. The story is a little convoluted, especially when characters keep removing rubber face-masks, but I think it goes something like this: the leader of a foreign intelligence agency plots to steal a revolutionary Soviet dental chair. To carry out the operation, sensitive information is passed from agent to agent in the most ridiculous ways, topped only by the manner in which their enemy surveils them in return. One spy disguises himself beneath an artificial puddle; a submarine surfaces in a swimming pool; a leeching teenager is conned into accepted a nudie magazine and a 40 mega-ton hydrogen bomb; a top spy-dog is cunningly disguised as a cat; the identity of a dubious old lady is revealed only after five rubber masks have been extricated (sounds a bit like 'Mission: Impossible II (2000)'). Gamburg's characters, particularly the Soviet bunch, treat their jobs with the utmost seriousness, and their stone-cold willingness to perform even the most absurd duties is a source of much amusement. One resourceful Rusky, while chasing an enemy agent, even finds the time to stop a runaway locomotive with his bare hands!
